


how did we get lost, can’t get back again

by alesford



Category: Wynonna Earp (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Gen, Season 3 Spoilers, Sort of happy ending, post-season 3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-03
Updated: 2018-11-03
Packaged: 2019-08-16 21:53:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 845
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16503395
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alesford/pseuds/alesford
Summary: It’s been two months, three weeks, and four days. One love lost, long gone but never forgotten.Nicole used to love the songGardenby Dua Lipa. Now she kind of really hates it.





	how did we get lost, can’t get back again

**Author's Note:**

> This was a response to this anonymous angst prompt request received by [**@wayhaughtficrec**](https://wayhaughtficrec.tumblr.com/) on tumblr:
> 
>  
> 
> [ _Nicole likes the song Garden by Dua Lipa. It reminds her of Waverly. Then, Waverly gets taken to the LITERAL garden of eden. The song plays on Nicole’s shuffle and she’s hit with all f these memories of her And Waverly and it’s just like FUCK! And she breaks down (maybe wynonna comes to comfort her?) (Also maybe a happy ending. I like happy endings but maybe that’s just me)_ ](https://wayhaughtficrec.tumblr.com/post/179704967027/angsty-prompt-nicole-likes-the-song-garden-by-dua)
> 
>  
> 
> You asked. You got it.

 

**how did we get lost, can’t get back again**

_used to walk around your apartment_  
_with nothing, but a smile on me_  
_but tonight i’m so self conscious_  
_isn’t it so clear to see_  
_nothing’s ever perfect in paradise_  
_don’t know what it’s worth ‘til you pay the price_  
_when you bite your tongue does it draw blood?_  
_- ‘garden’ by dua lipa_

 

It’s been two months, three weeks, and four days. One love lost, long gone but never forgotten.

 

(She still goes to the woods some days. At least once a week.

It used to be more.

It used to be every day. Every single goddamn day. Waiting, wishing, hoping.

_Praying._

Until Wynonna found her drowning in her own sorrow, choking on her own tears with cries of,  _I’m sorry, baby. I’m trying. I’m trying to get you back. I’m coming for you, I swear._

It used to be more. Every day. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday…

Until she forgot the day of the week. Until her heart couldn’t break anymore, couldn’t shatter into infinite pieces even if Nicole willed it so.

At least then, with her heart in  _n + 1_  fragments, she’d have something else to focus on instead of how she’s failed Waverly. Without her heart,  _without Waverly,_ she’d be nothing.

Nothing seems like a better alternative than broken.

Still. She goes to the woods. She waits and wishes and hopes and prays.

Wynonna comes with her.)

 

It’s been two months, three weeks, and four days. They aren’t any closer to figuring out how to open the Gate. They haven’t found any new information pertaining to the Garden and what lies within it. They don’t know if Doc is still alive. If Waverly is still alive.

 

Nicole thinks that she would feel it in her bones. She thinks that she would feel it, that she would know the moment that her heart was ground into ash, burned away by miserable heartbreak and cast into the ether to disappear like stardust.

 

(Can you wish upon stardust? Can you wish for the love that it once was?

Can you wish upon the remnants of nothing but a broken heart, of loss?

Can you wish upon something that is no longer there?)

 

Nicole sits at the bar in Shorty’s. Instead of drowning in her sorrow and choking on her own tears in the woods, she drowns them in cheap whiskey and the pitying looks of what remains of Purgatory’s citizenry. She ignores them all.

 

She wants to order another drink. Her fourth. Maybe her fifth. She doesn’t remember and doesn’t particularly care. She wants to forget. Or maybe indulge the flood and suffocate on her own misery. Drowning shouldn’t be this difficult.

 

She begins to motion at Valdez when she hears it. The opening piano chords. The lyrics soon after.

 

_Remember when we swam in the ocean?_

 

Nicole is on her feet and stumbling towards the newly-installed jukebox in the corner of the bar before the second line of the song.

 

_Now we know what’s deep inside._

 

She trips over her own feet. It’s less than graceful. Far from sober. Not that she cares.

 

_Remember when we ran in the open?  
Now we know what’s in the wild._

 

She bumps into the York brothers. Slips away from Jeremy’s steadying hands. She’s sloppy and drunk and so very, very lost. She’s breaking into infinite pieces.

 

She doesn’t want this. She’s changed her mind.

 

 _Used to think that this love was heaven sent_  
_How did we get lost, can’t get back again  
_ _Tell me, is the light on the outside?_

 

Nicole’s grip is tight and sure when her fingers wrap around the cord running from the back of the jukebox to the outlet in the wall. Her strength is steadfast as she pulls. The music stops.

 

She slams two twenties onto the counter as she stomps out of the bar.

 

Her watch beeps.

 

It’s been two months, three weeks, and five days.

 

She goes to the woods.

 

Wynonna is already there.

 

She opens the blanket wrapped around her shoulders to Nicole, and Nicole sinks into the warmth, tries to engulf her anguish with memories of love and family instead of loss and loneliness. She leans into Wynonna. Wynonna leans into her.

 

They sit together as the night sky grows impossibly darker. 

 

There is no stardust here tonight.

 

Waverly is still out there.

 

They sit together in silence, waiting and wishing and hoping and praying.

 

This is what they do in the woods after midnight. They grieve. They mourn. They dream to escape the nightmare.

 

And then–

Something happens.

 

Light cleaves the twilight darkness. The stairs appear. The Gate opens.

 

Doc walks free, alive and whole. Wynonna gasps.

 

And then–

 

Waverly walks free, alive and whole and radiant like the sun.

 

Nicole can  _breathe._

 

Because after two months, three weeks, and five days, the world split in two and the Gate opened. By the will and way of Waverly Earp, the Gate opened.

 

It’s been two months, three weeks, and five days.

 

Nicole doesn’t have to go to the woods anymore.

 

 


End file.
